A Look at Raul vs. Fidel

Cuba: A Look at Raul vs. Fidel
June 8, 2013
Martin Guevara*

HAVANA TIMES — I think that the timid but significant changes that Raul
Castro has been implementing – with a number of variations that any
sound analyst would make – are the best thing that could happen to Cuba.

The general-turned president, however, doesn't exactly have the moral
authority to advance these changes as his own, as he was never a
dissident, never even a key figure of the Marxist-Leninist project
undertaken on the island, within the Politburo or any other political
institution established by the "Retrogression".

In his defense, we can point to the fact that, in terms of awareness of
everyday reality and the sympathy and affection awakened among the
people, the contrast between Cuba's Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR),
Raul's milieu of experimentation, and any other government institution
was something you felt at base level.

It was common, for instance, to see a lieutenant colonel from the FAR
heading back home in a public bus, asleep on his seat, totally oblivious
to his surroundings, feeling protected, even, or to come across this
officer giving someone from the neighborhood a lift on the side-car of
his motorcycle.

To see a Ministry of the Interior (MININT) officer or Ministry-level
cadre from the Cuban Communist Party (PCC), of the same rank or even
three military ranks beneath our lieutenant colonel, do the same thing,
you'd simply have to be dreaming.

What's more, the FAR produced the products they consumed. As an
institution, it had a different experience of reality than the rest of
the country, an economically healthier existence, even during the long
years of Soviet subsidy.

They produced everything they needed in terms of viands, provisions and
essential equipment (provided it wasn't a heavy or arms industry item).
I worked as a civilian at a company run by the FAR and I am pleased to
be able to vouch for this.

None of the changes Cuba has witnessed run contrary to Fidel's political
vision, as some would have us believe, or have been implemented so as to
bring a new, brilliant revolutionary – Raul Castro, the dissident – to
the fore.

The changes are part of a plan in which Raul assumes the risk, as the
person at the helm, of being remembered as someone who did well,
regularly or terribly (and this is something only time will decide).

Fidel, however, has earned an ineffaceable place in world history, as a
leader considered excessively cruel by some, a dictator who governed by
whim by others, or on a spectrum that runs from being a phoney to being
a revolutionary to his sympathizers.

The fact I commend Raul for doing what I believe is right, given the
current state of affairs in Cuba, does not, in any way, blind me with
respect to his trajectory in power, nor does it make me forget that the
man who would eliminate you if you showed the slightest bit of sympathy
for any letter of the alphabet other than the "A", is the same man who,
today, assures you his policy is called "Z" and disturbingly intimidates
you so that you will adhere to it.

From a pragmatic point of view, this would be beyond reproach. It does
not, however, show much conviction. It recalls, rather, the most
profound act of self-criticism he was able to muster after
green-lighting the execution of his friend and subordinate Arnaldo
Ochoa, for having been oblivious, as the general's immediate superior,
to the shady dealings Ochoa was accused of during a
less-than-transparent, summary and highly irregular trial.

The confession, "I looked in the mirror and saw tears running down my
face!", left all of us speechless. Then, we had expected something along
the lines of "I'm sorry for not having been vigilant enough", or a "I,
his immediate superior, shoulder the responsibility for his actions, I
will take the blame, or resign," or perhaps a "I want to dedicate this
hara-kiri to all of the fans who are watching us on TV right now."

To be frank, no one expected that last one. Raul is not Japanese.

In any event, no one should be at all concerned about future jobs or
positions at the top. A new obsequious bunch already took them a long
time ago.

Mao's granddaughter is one of China's wealthiest women, Dos Santos'
daughter is the richest woman in Angola, Fidel Castro's son wins golf
tournaments in Varadero, Raul's daughter asks for more and more visas to
travel to the United States… all of this makes us suspect that
revolutions are carried out so that this vile (but nonetheless
much-coveted and sought-after) thing called "money" can change hands.

It remains to be seen where those who once vociferated the grandiloquent
"Homeland or Death", and the fewer and fewer who do so today, will be in
a decade or so. Will they take to the Sierra Maestra or Escambray
mountain ranges to lead a counter-attack on this return to capitalism,
this vile act of treachery, or whether they will rather resemble the
daughters or granddaughters of those iron-willed leaders, who are much
like those who are in power today?

One thing must remain clear: what makes a person a member of the Left,
of a progressive or anti-establishment movement, is not what they say
about themselves. As with everything else in life, it is a question of
deeds, not of words.

Those who wield power and live like kings are the Right, no matter how
they wish to portray themselves, and those who, in some way, seek to
bring balance to the equation, are everything else in the spectrum. As
in the good-cop-bad-cop trick, there will doubtless be some who will try
to convince us that Raul freed Cuba by ripping it from Fidel's claws.
—–
(*) An authorized Havana Times translation of the original published in
Spanish by Martin Guevara.

http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=94300